


V is for Vhenadahl

by chileancarmenere



Series: Alistair Alphabet [22]
Category: Dragon Age
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-29
Updated: 2012-04-29
Packaged: 2017-11-04 13:30:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/394419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chileancarmenere/pseuds/chileancarmenere





	V is for Vhenadahl

Kaillian throws herself at a red-headed elf, babbling so fast that Alistair can’t make out what she’s saying. Alistair looks down, digging his boot into the ground. It seems like he infringes here, where a small inquisitive crowd gathers and looks at him with mistrustful eyes. Zevran is throwing sultry glances at a group of scandalized, giggling elvhen girls, while Morrigan stands to the side, silent and haughty. He realizes that he’s always been among his own kind, and wonders if Kaillian felt this way, always surrounded by tall people with rounded ears.

Suddenly, she’s tugging on his arm, drawing him forwards. “Alistair, this is Shianni. Shianni, Alistair.”

Shianni shakes his hand, giving him a wary look. “Hello, Alistair.” She then promptly ignores him and turns back to Kaillian. “You have no idea what’s happened. Since your wedding…”

Alistair knows that Shianni’s obviously got a reason for treating him like something unpleasant you’d find on the bottom of your boot, and she’s got something clearly important to tell Kaillian, but he’s only human and he has to blurt out “Your wedding? I didn’t know you were married!”

Kaillian frowns at him. “I’m not. It’s…I was betrothed.”

“But still…what do you mean, _was_?”

Shianni throws Kaillian a look, _can-you-believe-this-shem_ , and Alistair feels like a total idiot, but he needs to know right now. Kaillian puts her hands on her hips. “There were rapists, and my betrothed got a sword through his gut. Can you give us a minute?”

She’s trying to shock, and she does it very well. Alistair feels like she just planted a mailed fist in his stomach. “Yeah,” he says quietly, wishing that the muddy ground would swallow him whole. “I’ll just…be over there.” He trudges over to the giant tree, where two dogs snap at each other over a dry bone, and realizes that he’s done much more than wander into someone else’s territory. He’s wandered into someone else’s world entirely.

A few minutes later, Kaillian comes over to the tree. Alistair turns a little towards her, _I’m sorry I’m an idiot, can you at least try and forgive me_ , but she stares straight ahead. A little branch is eye-height to her, and she snaps it off, methodically shredding the bark.

The silence is too much for him to bear. “Kaillian, I’m…”

“We plant these trees in every alienage.” Her voice is only just above a whisper, and he shuts up as soon as he hears her talking. “They’re called vhenadahl trees. We plant them to remind ourselves of the forests where we come from.”

She snaps the branch neatly in half and throws it down. “Which is stupid, really. We laugh at the Dalish and say they aren’t real. I was betrothed because it’s the _custom_ , which protected us a whole lot when Vaughn rampaged into the alienage and took us all back to his estate to be gang-raped. Having a vhenadahl tree, trying to uphold our ancient _customs_ , really did a lot for my betrothed when he got a sword through his belly trying to protect me when he didn’t even know how to load the crossbow he had. City elves don’t give a shit about where they come from.”

She pounds her fist into the tree suddenly, making him jump. He wishes he could say something, but he knows nothing about the desperate world she’s painted. She breathes in, dropping her shoulders back, and when she speaks again, the terrible bitterness is pushed deep down. “We need to get into that quarantine.”

She turns on her heel and strides towards the crowd. A glint of gold where she was standing catches Alistair’s eye, and he bends down to pick up a ring, just the size for a slender elven finger. When he tilts it towards the light, he can just make out elvhen words on the inside of the band. He can’t read elvhen, but he doesn’t need to, nor does he need to ask Zevran if he can read it. He knows what it says well enough.


End file.
